


a long way to go

by fiveyaaas



Series: under mistletoe [4]
Category: The Umbrella Academy (TV)
Genre: Age Difference, F/M, Fluff, Friends to Lovers, Light Angst, Mutual Pining, Older Man/Younger Woman, Older Woman/Younger Man, Sexual Humor, but i’m caught up🤪🤪, i am about to post a fuckton of works, this fic might just be a rant about karens in disguise, will examine that later
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-13
Updated: 2020-12-13
Packaged: 2021-03-11 04:40:47
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,208
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28049400
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fiveyaaas/pseuds/fiveyaaas
Summary: It had crushed him, realizing that his appearance was literally the only thing keeping him from spending the lifetime of happiness he’d often fantasized about when he’d been starving every night under a moonless sky.
Relationships: Number Five | The Boy/Vanya Hargreeves
Series: under mistletoe [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2036878
Comments: 6
Kudos: 43
Collections: Harcest Ficmas 2020





	a long way to go

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Jules5971](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jules5971/gifts).



“Why are you forcing me to do this?” 

When Vanya had told him that she wanted to go shopping with him, Five had nearly groaned. Going out in public a lot of times made him uncomfortable these days. He now, thankfully, appeared to be in his early twenties, but there was still the  _ regular _ comment that Vanya got, usually from middle-aged women, saying, “You must have had him young!” She was in her mid-30s, both physically and mentally, still so young. Every time she heard  _ that  _ though, he’d catch her staring in the mirror later- running her fingers over her developing crow’s feet or tugging at the few gray strands of her hair. It made his blood boil.

The absolute worst thing though, was when he’d been physically around sixteen and mentally sixty-one, and he’d heard Ben asking if she thought that she’d ever be with Five. He’d ducked down, eavesdropping and feeling guilty for it. She’d explained that she’d crushed on him as a kid, and she still cared for him in many ways now...But she couldn’t see herself being with him because of ‘how it would look.’

It had crushed him, realizing that his appearance was literally the only thing keeping him from spending the lifetime of happiness he’d often fantasized about when he’d been starving every night under a moonless sky.

Now, going out with her and hearing those comments reminded him of how he’d still failed to get a proper body. It reminded him of the faint sound of disgust in her tone when she’d talked about her own feelings, like it was shameful to want him. Even if inside the walls of the mansion, he dutifully remained her best friend and sole confidante, when they were in public he felt shame pool in his stomach, felt embarrassment stain his cheeks.

“I don’t know what to get Ben,” she mumbled. “This is the first year he’s fully corporeal for the holidays. Giving a gift to him these past few years always felt patronizing.  _ Especially  _ the year when Klaus drank a lot of eggnog and the gift bag I handed him  _ phased through his body.” _

Five shrugged, glaring daggers at a woman in a ‘live, laugh, love’ sweater, mentally _ daring  _ her to come over and say something, “Eh, it’s the thought that counts.”

“He  _ cried,  _ Five.” 

Five frowned down at her, moving his gaze from the woman, who was now trying to argue with some overworked season employee at the mall with a shudder, “Vanya, sweetheart, you’re aware that ghosts can’t actually  _ cry.  _ Hell, since they’re not alive, is it even accurate to say they  _ feel?”  _ It was shameful, deplorable really, that he would go take a shower after they got home and jerk off to the way she’d blushed at him using a pet name for her. 

“Ben has feelings,” she snapped, and he realized she was actually just flushing from anger. Either way, her yelling at him was more action than he’d gotten in the past eight years in this body, and he was all for it, wanting to press her buttons enough that she would  _ slap _ him. Or use her  _ powers  _ on him.

He really should consider just biting the bullet and sleeping with a cougar that had no problem with the fact that he looked twenty-one. Maybe the  _ ‘live, laugh, love’  _ lady was in a sexless marriage, considering the fact that she’d just taken out the big guns and asked to see the manager. Five would take pleasure in fucking her and never calling her again, actually. 

Alas, she was blonde. If he took her from behind, she’d have to agree to wearing a wig. 

Maybe he could get Vanya to slap him, after all. In the holiday spirit. To boost morale. Whatever.

Trying to put as much ‘superior bastard’ into his voice as possible, Five sneered, “Oh, could you tell he had feelings from a chill in the air? Or was it that Casper turned on a few sinks in the fourth floor bathroom?” 

“Why are you being such a  _ dick?” _

‘Because I’m horny,’ he thought. Aloud, he said, “Because I’m pissed that you forced me to do something as stupid as  _ shopping  _ with you. I have better things to do than spend time with-“

Oh, fuck. 

When her face crumpled and she ran away before she could start sobbing, Five made an attempt to go after her but was thwarted by Ben, appearing suddenly and hissing, “Do  _ not  _ make me use the monsters on you in public.” 

Five sighed, loudly. “What the fuck are you doing here, anyways?”

“Well, Ebenezer, I’m here because I’m the ghost of Christmas…” At the threatening look Five gave him, Ben trailed off, sighing loudly. “I wanted to know what Vanya was getting me so that I could choose whether or not I wanted to get her a Stradivarius violin or a first edition copy of her favorite Dostoyevsky novel, so I tagged along to see what she was getting me because I knew she would get something great. Ya know, because she’s thoughtful and kind and not a bastard to the people she loves. It’s the first time I’m ever actually going to celebrate the holidays with her, considering she used to always be sent to her room. Or did you forget about that, Grinch?”

“Am I Ebenezer Scrooge or the Grinch?”

“The Grinch. And Vanya is Little Cindy-Lou Who, and you’re pissed off that she doesn’t want to fuck you so you’re being a little bitch about it.” 

“I’m starting to think we had  _ vastly  _ different interpretations of the themes in  _ How the Grinch Stole Christmas.  _ You see, Ben, the story was actually discussing how consumerism during a holiday that is truly meant to be about-” Ben’s glare didn’t threaten him, but the fact that he could channel monsters out of his stomach sure as fuck did. “Okay, fine. Yes. I’m being an asshole to Vanya. You would be too if you had heard… I dunno, let’s say  _ Klaus,  _ say something like  _ that  _ about you.”

“No, I wouldn’t,” Ben told him. “First of all, Klaus and I are in a  _ good  _ place _.  _ Second of all, you  _ know  _ she didn’t mean it like that. Third of all, if anybody acted this way about her, you would rip them to shreds.”

Five would never admit to anybody in the world that Ben quite possibly had maybe .0000000000000000000000000000001 percent of a point. 

“You know I’m right, and you also know that she’s somewhere crying and probably going to cause the end of the world with her emotions.”

Five frowned. In his best friend’s defense, he said, “She’s not completely irrational, and she has  _ excellent  _ control of her powers.”

“Last June, she saw a right wing, Christian protester at pride and caused a building to collapse on him.”

“As she should! She was just doling out God’s wrath towards homophobia justified through religion. That way, God didn’t have to do it Themself.”

“Don’t distract me! You need to go to apologize to her. Right now.”

“I was about to do that,” Five defended weakly.

“Yeah, and you were probably about to be even more of a bastard. What the Hell is wrong with you? Don’t you love her?” 

He closed his eyes for just a second, inhaling sharply. In one breath, he admitted, “Vanyatoldmeshe’sthinkingaboutdatingagain.” 

_ “And? _ Are you not happy for her?”

Five rolled his eyes, “Of course I’m not happy for her. Would I act like  _ this  _ if I was?”

“Five, you gotta realize that she doesn’t want to be with you. Even if it’s for a reason beyond your control, and even if she does wish the circumstances were different… They’re not different. So you gotta be her friend and be a  _ good  _ friend. She deserves that.” 

The guilt finally got to him, and he wished it hadn’t. He wished he could hate her or leave her behind again. He wished that he actually was _able_ __ move on when she clearly had. 

“Did you know that she used to sleep in your room? When you left? She never lost hope that you’d come home.”

“There’s no need to lay it on so thick,” Five grumbled. “It’s just… Ben, I  _ know  _ it’s my fault that I can’t be with her. When I chose to leave her behind, when I ignored her until she caused the end of the world… There was a point where I held out hope, but she doesn’t want me  _ like this.” _

It occurred to him that she was probably hearing this conversation, and then the guilt became crushing against his chest. “I’m an awful friend,” Five said, wanting to apologize to her wherever she was. “And I want to be a better friend to her. There are times when I think I am getting better, but, and if you repeat this to anybody, I will feed you to the eldritch… I’m insecure about this. When I was trying to stop the apocalypse, I didn’t even have time to think about the unsettling feeling of knowing there was something  _ off  _ about me. That I could  _ never  _ have a chance to settle down and live an  _ ordinary  _ life, which is all I ever used to want once everything settled down. And I’m sorry that I’m a bad friend to her, but the concept that she would have that with somebody else when there’s even a  _ chance  _ that we could have had that-“

He spotted her in his peripheral, hiding behind a rack of clothes like she was six years old. If she was his mark and trying to hide from him, she’d have already been dead. Still, seeing a 37 year old peeking through a row of sweaters made him annoyingly fond. Clearing his throat and giving no indication to the fact that he knew she was eavesdropping, he told Ben, “I  _ want  _ to be good to her, Ben, and I truly don’t even deserve her as a  _ friend  _ when I act like this.” 

* * *

He didn’t realize that when he went back to his room that she’d  _ ambush  _ him for saying those things. 

“You’re in love with me?” 

_ “What?”  _ He was confused that this was what she was bringing up. “I mean, yeah, but why are you here?”

Her right eye twitched. 

Five moved to lay down, but she grabbed his arm. 

“What?” This time when he asked, his tone was just exasperated, laying down against his mattress and tugging her right along with him. 

“Why didn’t you  _ tell _ me?”

“Think of  _ how it would look,  _ V,” he quipped bitterly.

“Oh.”

Clearly, she realized what he’d witnessed. 

“Yeah,  _ ‘oh.’” _

“Five, I’m sorry, I thought… I just assumed you didn’t feel that way about me when I said it. So I said the most obvious excuse I could give, and I just-”

“Vanya,” he interrupted, closing his eyes in hopes that it would somehow stop her from seeing the pain in them.“If you don’t want to be with me, just say that. You don’t have to try to comfort me; I don’t  _ care.” _

“Could you stop being a dick for maybe 8 seconds?”

He didn’t respond.

That was, until she was pressing her soft lips to his own. His eyes opened up, face heating as he watched the way her eyes closed when she kissed him. Five realized he wasn’t kissing her back the second she pulled away, and then he was afraid to kiss her, convinced she’d use it against him somehow. Or worse, she didn’t actually want to kiss him, and she was just trying to appease him, and-

“I’ve waited so long to do that,” Vanya muttered. “And I’m so mad at you right now.”

He wasn’t sure where she was going with this, so he tried being silent, hoping that that would make her happy. 

“How is it that you  _ never  _ shut up, but you’re silent now?”

Fuck. “I’m, uh…” A giant moron. He was a giant moron. His entire life was a lie; he was fumbling the  _ one  _ time he actually wanted to be good at something. “Thank you?”

* * *

Five had decided to hide in his room for the rest of his life, avoiding Vanya, when Ben, rudely, broke down the door. 

“Alright, you melodramatic bastard.”

Melodramatically, Five turned his body to the wall, trying to hide from the gaze of his now-alive friend. 

“I have decided that my gift to Vanya this year will actually be you. Not in a sexy way. Or, perhaps in a sexy way, but a sexy way in which you spare all details from everybody. And before you try to object, remember that I was dead for many years.” 

“You can’t use the dead card anymore, Ben. You’re alive now.”

“I’ll die again if you don’t get together.”

“Now who's being melodramatic?” 

(They both were. At all times.) 

“Five, I need you to accept that if you don’t get your head out of your ass right now, I will tell Vanya every weird fantasy you’ve ever had about her.” 

Five pursed his lips. “You don’t know any of them.” 

“Ghosts can read thoughts, Five.”

“No, they can’t.” 

“Do you really want to find out?” In a stage whisper, he added, “I know about the Marilyn-”

“Goddammit.” Five was  _ not  _ motivated through Ben by any means. He simply wanted to check in on Vanya. 

When he did, he wished he had just gone earlier. She was staring forlorny at a piece of music, and he wondered if she was trying to work up the courage to play. They’d all tried to find ways to encourage it, including a new violin that had never hurt anybody, all kinds of scores, even asking her to teach them. It hadn’t encouraged her at all, and he wished there was something he could do, knowing how much it meant to her. 

“I’m sorry,” he said without preamble, crossing his arms over his chest. She glanced up in confusion. “I’ve been a bad friend.”

“Yeah, you have.” He flinched, even at the teasing tone. “And you’ve been an idiot.”

Five frowned, staring at the wall behind her. 

“Acknowledge that you’ve been an idiot please.”

“Are you  _ serious?” _

“Say, ‘Vanya, I’m sorry I was an idiot.’” 

“No.”

She yawned, “Alright, fine. B-”

“I’m sorry I was an idiot,” Five said, through gritted teeth. She was disturbingly talented at the silent treatment, once having gone an entire month somehow. If he didn’t apologize, how she wanted, he imagined she could go years by now. “Happy? 

“No.”

His jaw locked. 

“Why didn’t you tell me how you felt?”

“Because I know you don’t want me when I look like  _ this.” _

“Like a person in their early twenties? I know you’re in your sixties, and it might suck for you… but there’s no reason I’d morally object to it at this point.”

“You did at one point.” He still wouldn’t meet her eyes. 

“I would have waited to be with you, likely. If I had known how you felt.”

“Right, you’d have waited for me. Great.” Maybe he just really enjoyed sabotaging his life. He’d have to examine that further at some point. 

“I would have,” Vanya snapped. “I waited seventeen years to even  _ see  _ you again, not knowing if you were dead or alive.”

“I spent over twice that  _ knowing  _ you were dead.” 

“Is that what this is? You’re so upset with me for causing the apocalypse that you’re doing whatever you can to make  _ me _ hurt as badly as  _ you?” _

And then it occurred to him. She really  _ didn’t _ think that he actually cared for her. Vanya hadn’t been lying when she’d said the other day that she'd used their situation as an excuse. Somehow, she doubted that he had feelings for her, which was probably made worse by the fact that he’d acted like such an ass.

“Vanya, in all the years you have known me, have I ever pretended to care about  _ anyone  _ I disliked?”

When she didn’t answer, he continued, “I despise being around most people, Vanya. There is no reason that I would  _ pretend  _ to love you.” 

“Lately, you haven't even pretended to  _ like _ me.”

He sighed, loudly. “Vanya, I love you, but I think there’s likely a reason you never told me how you felt.” She hadn’t even  _ said  _ how she felt, really.

“You’re right.” His shoulders stiffened, even though he’d suspected she didn’t want him already. “There is something.”

“And what is that?” The words tasted like ash. 

She ran a hand through her hair distractedly. “Five, are you ever going to actually forgive me?”

“For what?” He was genuinely asking, considering he didn’t really think there was anything she had to even  _ apologize  _ for. 

“For ending the world.” 

Oh.  _ That.  _

Truly, he hadn’t really even given it much thought. When there had been a few seconds where he’d thought either they would all die together or he’d see Vanya die in front of him, all of the anger had left him. If it had been anyone else, he could have held onto that grudge and likely would have killed  _ most  _ anybody else already. 

But it was Vanya. 

“I already have. First of all, I don’t think you’ll ever do it again. Second of all, it wasn’t just  _ your  _ fault. Even if you had learned your powers and we’d all treated you right, the end of the world would have still happened as it had been slated to do.”

“Then why didn’t you ever tell  _ me  _ how you felt?” Her voice was small, so small, and he wanted nothing more than for her to look him in the eyes. 

“I mean for a while because of…  _ this.”  _ He gestured vaguely to his body, which he supposed didn’t really mean anything anymore. She had been right; most people wouldn’t even really take much note of their appearances. While he was sure he’d get the occasional comment implying he was trying to take her money, he didn’t think that the majority of people would see them and think much of it at all. 

“And then after that it was because of my comment,” Vanya added for him, and he shrugged. “Is that  _ really  _ all?”

“Of course it is,” Five promised.

“But why didn’t say all this the other day?” 

“It was stressful,” he defended himself, hating that he was in his sixties and  _ blushing  _ over a  _ kiss.  _ “You just randomly kissed me, and then you said you were mad at me. I didn’t know how to respond.”

“So you said. ‘thank you’?” 

“It seemed like the right idea at the time.”

“Alright, so if I kissed you now?”

Even though his face was burning (which he genuinely thought he was incapable of being embarrassed, but apparently Vanya had powers of  _ flustering  _ people), he said, “I mean, I suppose I’d be more prepared.”

“Do you want me to kiss you, Five?” Her voice was gentle, and she was walking so close. His heart pounded, and he knew she heard it. Weakly, he nodded. She smiled, “I will if you agree to find presents afterwards.” 

It was a fair deal. He closed the distance between them and mentally prepared himself for purgatory (or, in other words, the mall.) 

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! I have quite a few fics posting today, and I should have them all up within two hours. (Plus, updates to “Journal of Ardency” and “Raising Hell”!)


End file.
